[Interpretationandmethods] advice on job talks

[Dvora Yanow]

Hi.  I think we might well put our collective heads together and have a brief discussion of the kinds of questions one might anticipate (from people who don't quite grasp how interpretive research design, methods, analyses, etc. are different from positivist-informed ones), as well as some good replies one might have on hand for dealing with these.

One question I suppose is still being asked, something along the lines of:  "But I don't understand - what are/were your dependent and independent variables?!"

I think being prepared for the question - so one doesn't get too flustered by the utter mismatch between it and what one has just presented - is more than half the battle.  I think the reply has to point out that this kind of approach is not framed in the vocabulary/thought pattersn of a variables approach - and then to explain that further.

If the question is also masking/articulating (inexplicitly) a concern for "rigor," one can reply that the work was very systematic - and then be prepared to say/show how/in what ways.

And then there might be questions about the 'validity,' 'generalizability,' etc. of the research - for which one might well be prepared with replies about the 'trustworthiness' of the research, indicating that interpretive methods use a different vocabulary for this, too.  Peri Schwartz-Shea's chapter (5) in our co-edited Interpretation and Method (M E Sharpe, 2006) gives an extensive overview of these issues.

What other 'challenging' questions have people encountered in job talks?  (or on conference panels, or in journal ms. reviews - the same issues keep coming up!).  How have you answered them?  -- or, if you're at all like me, what did you figure out after the fact that you should have, or wished you had, said?

Dvora Yanow

-----Original Message-----
From: interpretationandmethods-bounces at listserv.cddc.vt.edu [mailto:interpretationandmethods-bounces at listserv.cddc.vt.edu]On Behalf Of Lara Rusch
Sent: vrijdag 2 november 2007 21:25
To: interpretation and methods group
Subject: [Interpretationandmethods] advice on job talks

Hello all,

A lot of advice is floating around my dept.'s grad list right now about
job talk presentations.

I was wondering if anyone has particular advice or recommendations for job
talk presentations using interpretive methods? I'm sure I'm not the only
one wondering about this...

Thanks!
Lara Rusch

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